


The Nightingale

by flowercrownclem



Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: 1930's Los Angeles, Alternate Universe - 1930s, Cashton are Michael's roomates, Composer/Piano Player!Michael, Great Depression, Jazz Music, M/M, Mysterious!Luke, fairy tale AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2017-02-24
Packaged: 2018-09-23 10:57:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9652898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flowercrownclem/pseuds/flowercrownclem
Summary: Michael hadn't written a decent song in weeks and Luke hadn't had a place to call home in much longer. Michael wasn't sure if he would ever love somebody and Luke wasn't sure if anyone could ever love him.A clem fairy tale set in the 1930's, featuring Michael as an uninspired song writer, Luke as a mysterious music lover and a small songbird that brings them together.





	1. Chapter 1

    There once was a boy named Michael, who thought in lyrics and spoke in melodies. Ever since he was a child he’d never thought himself good at anything but music and so music became his life.

    A long time ago, but not so very long that even your grandparents couldn’t have been at least a thought, he moved very far away from his home. He hoped that if he went somewhere far away that he could perhaps make enough money to live while making music and still be able to send a bit back home to his family every month. Money was very hard to come by where he lived and even though he moved clear across the globe, about as far as one could go without leaving the earth all together, he found that money wasn’t any easier in California. He spent the first three weeks of his new life sleeping in a run down motel that didn’t feel very safe or very clean at all, until he wandered into a dimly lit jazz club one night and met a curly haired boy named Ashton who tended the bar at the club. Ashton was lucky that prohibition had ended just the year before and was able to make a steady wage, and he invited Michael to live with him and his roommate Calum. Their small house had only one bedroom but there was a decent enough couch in the living room and they offered it to him for a low monthly price that Michael was glad to accept.

One afternoon Michael was hunched over the piano (that had once belonged to Calum’s mother but since the dark-haired boy had never learned more than The Entertainer, the piano had become more Michael’s than his) when Calum came out of his and Ashton’s shared room, buttoning the cuffs of his shirt and securing the buttons of his braces.

“Are you ever going to stand up from that piano bench?” he asked, pulling the large case that held his stand-up bass from where he kept it in the coat closet. “I don’t think you’ve moved at all since I left for work this morning, or when I got home.”

“I’m trying to find inspiration.” Michael grit out restlessly, pressing his forehead against the wooden top of the upright piano. “I haven’t written a good song in  _ weeks _ and that company that’s been buying them is starting to get impatient. If I don’t deliver a good one in the next few days they’ll move on to the next desperate musician who’ll write them songs for next to nothing - and then where will I be?”

“Don’t worry about it, Mike,” Calum told him kindly. “You’ve still got a little money left from that last song, and you’ll get a bit more if it keeps selling. And anyway, Ashton and I are doing well enough that if you can’t make next month’s rent it’ll be okay.”

“You’re both too nice to me,” Michael grumbled, frowning. “Anyone else wouldn’t even have considered taking me in and yet here you are, both always letting me off easy and giving me so much.”

“You can pay us back when you’re a huge star and every name in the business is singing your songs,” Calum laughed, the corners of his eyes crinkling up. “Buy us a big ol’ house with a swimming pool and everything.”

“Oh sure,” Michael laughed back. “I’d about owe you that by the time I had the money for it.”

“But really, we don’t mind,” Calum said, his smile turning more sincere. “You might not be every homeowner’s dream tenant but we aren’t everyone’s dream landlords.”

Michael knew what Calum meant by his words, that he and Ashton didn’t share their bedroom just for the sake of cost, but he had never asked them about it. Ashton had laughed about their troubles finding a third roommate but he knew that it wasn’t always easy for the pair.

“Anyway, you’ll never get rich and famous if you don’t write any songs and you’ll never write any songs if you’re sitting inside every night staring at the ivory. Why don’t you come down to the club and we’ll see if we can’t get you inspired?”

Michael wanted to argue that he needed to stay at his piano just in case a stroke of inspiration suddenly hit him, but he knew that he’d get to see the other man play his bass and he hadn’t seen that since the night he first met Ashton, so he conceded. He straightened the still blank sheets of paper on the lid of the piano and took a moment to straighten out his clothes and grab a coat from the small trunk that sat beside his couch-turned-bed. Before long they were at the club, Michael complaining that the sun had yet to set and that nothing exciting was likely to happen until then, and Calum beaming over the bar at Ashton who was making conversation with the other customers.

Seeing that Calum wasn’t paying any mind to his grumbling, Michael turned his attention to the band on stage. They weren’t as experienced as the musicians that would take their place later in the night but they had an enthusiastic type of naivete that made their strings snap just a little sharper and their drums boom just a little louder. He found himself tapping his foot against the bottom of his bar stool and scanned his eyes over the crowd. In the shadows of one corner a man relaxed in a booth surrounded by other, less important-looking men and a few beautiful women. A few couples danced in the spaces between the tables and Michael briefly noted that he hadn’t danced with anyone since long before he left home.

As the sun continued to sink lower outside the club more lights came on inside and Michael’s eyes were drawn to the table just in front of the stage, to a younger blonde sat leaning forward in his seat and completely entranced by the music. Michael couldn’t see his face until the boy glanced down at his rusting pocket watch and looked back towards the entrance, his eyes locking on Michael’s through the smoky haze of the room. Michael only caught a glimpse of an upturned nose and a few unruly curls before the boy was gone, weaving between tables and disappearing out the door.

Michael forgot about the boy quickly, his attention shifting as Calum made his way towards the stage. He spent the rest of the evening watching the dark-haired man play with the rest of the band, his fingers weaving across the neck of his bass and his head bobbing in time with the drummer. Occasionally Michael would glance back to see Ashton even more entranced than he was, mixing cocktails blindly, unwilling to look away from the stage.


	2. Chapter 2

Michael let out a frustrated groan and let his hands fall down to his sides when what felt like the thousandth note he’d tried still hadn’t sounded right, wishing he had even an ounce of the talent Earl Hines or Cole Porter held in their little fingers. He just wanted one tune to come together but nothing he tried would satisfy him. Every combination of chords just reminded him of a song he’d already written or of one he’d already heard and he couldn’t get out of his head and just play something like he’d always done before. There were only so many words in the English dictionary and many fewer keys on a piano with which to write a song. Maybe Calum and Ashton were right and he needed to experience something worth writing about before he could write anything good. He’d spent too many days the same way not to keep writing the same songs.

He reached for his beaten up notebook and scratched down a few words.

_ Every day is the same. _

__ __ __ _ sun or the rain? _

__ He tried the hum the words, hoping they might turn into a full phrase but he couldn’t quite fit them together. He tinkered around on the piano, switching from C to A minor and frowning at the sound. It wasn’t right.

He played through every chord he knew but nothing sounded right.

He finally stood up, resigned to the fact that he’d never write another decent song so he may as well get some sleep, when he heard a light tap at the small window over his piano. He kneeled on the bench and leaned his elbows on the top of the piano to get a better look.

“Hey there,” he said softly, peering into the darkness outside at the tawny little bird perched on the windowsill. He lifted the glass and the bird trilled happily, bouncing forward to curl its toes over the front of the sill. “What are you doing out so late?”

The bird chirped again, louder this time, almost indignantly. Michael laughed, settling down to sit at the bench again. The bird kept chortling, its whistling almost human-like as a light tune began to form.

“Quite the songbird, aren’t you?” Michael grinned, absentmindedly tapping his fingers against the ivory keys to match the song of the bird. When he added a bit of intent to his playing and started playing fully formed chords the bird trilled loudly, fluffing out its feathers and preening.

“You like that?” Michael asked wryly, decorating the tune with a bit of flair and humming along while the bird kept singing.

_ “Walkin’ along,” _ Michael crooned, smiling widely at the little bird,  _ “ev’ry day is the same, whether I’m in the sun or if I’m in the rain...” _

__ The bird fluttered its wings excitedly and Michael tilted his head up to send it an exaggerated simpering smirk, the sky beginning to lighten outside the window.

_ “But you, baby, you... You caught my eye...” _

 

“New song?” Calum asked as he walked through the door that evening, hanging his hat beside the coat closet.

“Mhm,” Michael hummed, gaze still locked on the notebook if front of him. When he’d woken up only a few hours before he’d had a moment of panic, afraid he’d forgotten to write down what he’d played the night before and that it’d be lost forever. When he sat at the piano, however, neat lines were drawn across the pages of his notebook with every note. He was glad that even in his half-asleep stupor he must have remembered to record his progress.

“It’s sounding good,” Calum noted, peering over his shoulder to try and catch a glance at the lyrics. “That Nat Cole kid is playing down at the club again tonight and you’re coming with us.”

“I just went down there last night,” Michael told him distastefully. “Why do I have to go again?”

“Look how much it helped,” Calum pointed out. “You’re  _ writing _ again, instead of just staring at the piano. Imagine what good leaving the house regularly would do.”

Michael wanted to argue but he couldn’t help but see some logic in Calum’s words. Besides, he’d become stumped when he got to the bridge and maybe stepping away from the piano would help get the melody flowing like it had the night before.

And so he found himself sitting once again in the dusky club, this time having left his roommates at the bar and made his way to a table near the stage to watch the young Nat Cole and his band. Michael almost didn’t notice the boy at the table next to him, he was so caught up in the performance, but when he glanced over the boy sent him a wide smile. Michael’s lips turned up slightly in response, almost cautiously, and the boy’s smile faded a bit. When he pulled a brass pocket-watch from his pocket and set it on the table in front of him Michael recognized him as the same boy he’d seen the night before. He was pretty, Michael thought, with big blue eyes and soft looking wavy hair. 

“What do you think?” he asked before he could stop himself, leaning closer and raising his voice to be heard over the music. The boy looked at him with wide, questioning eyes and Michael nodded towards the stage.

“They’re good,” the boy smiled. “He’s got a great voice. Decent lyricist, too. I’m always shit with lyrics.”

“You play?” Michael asked, shifting his chair closer to the other boy’s table.

“Yeah, guitar,” he smiled. “Tryin’a be the next Eddie Lang.”

“I’m sure you will be,” Michael grinned.

“Eh,” the boy shrugged. “Maybe.”

“I’m Michael, by the way,” Michael held out his hand.

“Luke.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's just gonna be one more chapter after this one I think, otherwise I'd probably never finish this fic. I really like the idea of it but I keep getting writers' block every time I go to work on it. Plus I started writing another fic last night that I've already written more for than I have in a few months for this one. That one's also a period piece set in LA, but it's really different. It's set in the 1970's instead of the 30's and hopefully I'll have the first chapter posted pretty quickly after I post the last chapter of this one :)  
> Thank you for reading and sorry this fic's pretty short <3

**Author's Note:**

> This has been sitting untouched for over a month and I'm hoping that if I post this first chapter I'll get motivated to write the rest of it. I figured out the plot for the most part but I keep being really uninspired whenever I start writing it.  
> Hopefully there'll be another chapter up before too long <3


End file.
